Amy Tan's "The Bonesetter's Daughter" Quiz

Answer: In pages of Chinese calligraphy given to her daughter

While LuLing's daughter speaks some Chinese, the pages of calligraphy are too much for her. She puts off deciphering them for years, until she finds another chapter hidden in her mother's house and finally hires a translator.

Answer: The woman called Precious Auntie

Precious Auntie (in Mandarin, Bao Bomu) is, of course, LuLing's real mother - not the woman referred to as Mother throughout the book. Horribly burned and disfigured in a suicide attempt after the deaths of her father and husband-to-be, Precious Auntie became LuLing's nursemaid, and the child never knew her true parentage until her mother is already dead.

Answer: She's a ghostwriter for self-help books.

Why, Ruth wonders, is she unable to speak up for herself in her own life, while simultaneously massaging prose and writing advice for others? She has an excellent reputation in her field, but her family does not understand her work; her aunt GaoLing, for example, thinks that she basically takes dictation.

As she tells Art at one point, "I can describe how to find happiness in ten chapters, but I still don't know what it is."

Answer: Her boyfriend, Art, and his two daughters

After a bitter divorce from his first wife, Art doesn't want to marry again; thus, he and Ruth are committed to each other, but they are not married. Art's two daughters from that marriage, Dory and Fia, spend half of their time with the couple in their San Francisco flat. They're teenagers when the story opens.

Answer: No

Ruth's annual muteness is one of the book's mysteries. It has been going on ever since she met Art, and has become a fun ritual within her family. Art's daughters call it "The Days of No Talk," a time when they'll withdraw from work and responsibility and go on a vacation of sorts; the year the book opens, that trip is to Lake Tahoe. Ruth, however, sees her muteness as a metaphor: she finds it difficult to speak up for herself and make sure that her needs are addressed, whether she's dealing with her mother, with Art, or with his daughters.

Answer: Just after Precious Auntie's suicide.

LuLing wants to marry Chang Fu Nan, an alliance that will benefit both families economically. Precious Auntie is beside herself at the news, however: Fu Nan's father was responsible for the deaths of her father and her groom. She writes a long manuscript explaining these events to LuLing and concludes by confessing that she is the teenager's mother, not just her nursemaid. Later Precious Auntie asks, "Now that you have read my story, what do you feel toward me?" - and LuLing, not wanting to admit that she hasn't read the story, shouts that "Even if the whole Chang family were murderers and thieves, I would join them just to get away from you!" The next morning Precious Auntie has died by her own hand, the wedding is canceled, and LuLing finally reads the manuscript and learns what she has done.

Answer: At a girls' orphanage and school.

LuLing is sent to a girls' orphanage run by American missionaries. Although the institution is overcrowded, they agree to take LuLing because she is literate and can tutor the other girls in reading and writing. As she matures there, she becomes a teacher and makes some of the friends who will define her young adulthood: Ruth Grutoff, the American headmistress for whom LuLing will name her daughter; Sister Yu, a good friend and a political chameleon; and her first husband and great love, the archeologist Kai Jing, son of Teacher Pan.

Answer: Miss Grutoff has an extra visa to the U.S. Who will go?

Miss Grutoff, an American citizen, spent the war in a Japanese P.O.W. camp and is so ill she must take a companion to return to the United States. Sister Yu and Teacher Pan insist that they are too old to uproot, so LuLing and GaoLing - both of whom are desperate to go - have a battle of polite refusals. GaoLing ends up going to America to flee her abusive marriage to Chang Fu Nan (who was originally promised to LuLing) while LuLing waits in Hong Kong for her visa paperwork to come through.

They end up marrying Chinese-American brothers who father their children, but LuLing's husband (Ruth's father) is killed in a hit-and-run accident before the birth of their baby.

Answer: Care for her aging mother

LuLing, some years past her three-score and ten, has begun to show signs of dementia and Alzheimer's. Recent events in her life are fading, and she is becoming unable to care for herself. Ruth's decision to move in with her mother and take care of her puts additional strain on her relationship with Art, who doesn't realize what he has until he's almost lost her.

They end up putting LuLing in an assisted-living facility (using considerable finesse to sell her on the idea) and finally getting married.

Answer: Yes

A year after the opening of the book, Ruth has given up on learning the real name of her grandmother, Precious Auntie. LuLing, her mental condition deteriorating, can no longer remember, and Aunt GaoLing never knew. But one day, when Ruth and Art are at a museum with LuLing and her boyfriend Mr. Tang (the translator Ruth had hired for her mother's manuscript), they see a Chinese oracle bone, which jogs LuLing's memory of Precious Auntie - the bonesetter's daughter.

She remembers and reveals the name, but if you want to know it too, you'll have to read the book!